Lady Soames

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 20:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety two, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:31

My Castaway this week is a historian, a distinguished author, and now chairman of the Board of the National Theatre. It is, however, her family which she considers as most important to her. My whole life, she says, has been as a daughter and a mother and a wife.

Presenter0:46

This is not such a limiting ambition as it might sound. Her father was the greatest British Prime Minister of the twentieth century, her husband an eminent politician and diplomat, and her eldest son is a member of Parliament. She herself is the youngest and only surviving child of Winston Churchill. She is Mary

Presenter1:05

You've said on several occasions, Lady Soames, that you feel like the last of the Moheans. Do questions go on coming in to you about your father?

Presenter1:13

Yes, it's very moving and also very interesting that

Presenter1:18

I get many, many letters during the course of the year from people of all ages and from many different countries.

Presenter1:28

wanting to know various things about my father,

Presenter1:32

Some of them sending me poems that he has evoked, some of them just wanting to say how much they've admired him. And um I find this

Presenter1:43

Deeply moving. But what sort of questions do they ask? One would have thought all the questions would have been answered by now. Yes. Well, some of them, of course, want to know how many cigars he smoked every day. And I'm not a very good informant, really, because I sort of never went round counting. But you can correct wrong assumptions, and I know that you were um rather critical of the recent biography of your father on television when it was suggested that.

Lady Soames1:45

But what sort of

Presenter2:09

His so called black dog, the depression that he suffered from, went on throughout his life and was responsible for all sorts of things. Now that's a very good example. I just thought that the case was tremendously overstated. I mean, uh my the black dog was an expression my father himself used about his feelings of depression.

Lady Soames2:15

Yes, that's a very good example.

Presenter2:28

But

Presenter2:29

Looking back on my childhood and adolescence and my grown-up recollections of him, I certainly don't remember great um traumatic depressions. When I saw his depressions were times when he was depressed after a great political defeat like 1945. But he picked himself up then very quickly because he had his painting and his writing and then anyhow he led his party back to victory. But I I mind when it's sort of elevated into some great sort of trauma. Well now, to the desert island and your eight records. What would be the first one that you'd play to yourself? I I love Beethoven's sixth symphony, the Pastoral Symphony. I've always loved the countryside. I was brought up completely in the country. When I married, we lived for a greater part of our married life in the country. And now my idea of bliss is Friday headed for the country. And so my favourite movement that I'd love to hear today is the first one, which in fact is annotated as Awakening of Cheerful Feelings Upon Arrival in the Country.

Presenter4:39

Part of the first movement of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony in F major, Op. sixty eight, played by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir George Schulte.

Presenter4:49

You and your father shared, among other things, Mary Soames, a love of Chartwell, the family home in Kent. Were you born there?

Presenter4:57

No, I was born in London.

Presenter5:00

The week for Chartwell was bought by my father, and I'm not sure but my mother was very pleased that this major act was accomplished while she was laid by and busy with other matters. But he'd seen it in Fallen. But he'd seen it, and indeed so had she, but she had

Speaker 45:15

But

Presenter5:19

Great reservations about whether they would really be able to afford to live there, reservations which, in fact, were later to be.

Presenter5:27

Quite well fulfilled. But the Chartrell was the only home I can remember. They moved into Chartwell when I was.

Presenter5:35

two because it took some time to do all the alterations. And I lived there

Presenter5:41

Almost without pause, until I was seventeen and went away for the wars. And what characterised that child for you? You see, I was the Benjamin of the family. There was Diana, Randolph, and Sarah. Diana, thirteen years older than me, Randolph, eleven, and Sarah, eight years. Then there was a little sister who I never knew who died when she was three, Marigold. And then there was me. So I was actually brought up almost as an only child. And because my parents had to be away a lot because of politics, my mother was very anxious that I should have a sort of completely stable and well-organised life at home. And a cousin of hers called Marriott White, known to all of us as Cousin Moppet or Nana, came when I was quite a baby. And she stayed with us all the years. I mean, she was still living at Chartwar when I left to join the army. And your mother and father were absent a lot, as you say, because of politics. Did you feel in a sense neglected by them? No, it never occurred to me. I'm told now that my parents were neglectful parents. I cannot find it so. When they were home very nearly every weekend, my father loved Chartwar more than anywhere else in the world. It was a lovely life, and I was never tucked away in the nursery. I was always trotting around all over the place, probably getting people's way. And my father loved having us all around. And I loved all the things he did. Of course, when he was working, that was absolutely time and place sacrosanct. And one wasn't allowed to whistle. And I think it was one of the reasons why I wasn't allowed to learn the piano was because the practising would have disturbed him. I didn't feel terribly deprived at the time, but I mean, you know, that was you didn't disturb his work at all, ever. But then you see, he was painting or he was building walls. And he loved one of us to be there. Did you help him build walls? Yes, I actually have to confess that I found being a bricklayer's mate rather boring, and then I used not to pay attention and drop a brick on my foot, so it sometimes used to end in tears. Why do you think he enjoyed it so much? He loved making things, devising things. And anyhow, he did. He used to spend hours, and he built the great wall that goes round the very big old kitchen garden at Chartwell. He and an old retired bricklayer from the village used to spend hours. And he learnt, I think, to lay bricks quite well. At one time, he held a union card. Did he really? Yes. So Chartwell was his workshop and his playground. And obviously, for you as a child, it was heaven, their golden memories. It was absolutely heaven there. And my parents were most loving. I think my father was an indulgent parent. My mother was not so easygoing and quite stern, but I think stern about the right things. She set very high standards. But I loved her. And they were both so enriching as parents. I can't describe to you. Next piece of music.

Lady Soames8:25

And

Presenter8:54

This was really the first piece of classical music which

Presenter9:00

Caught my my fancy. One of the cottages at Charltle was lived in by an old friend of my parents', who was very musical. I used to go and often visit her, and she used to play the piano beautifully, and I remember her playing this, and it's been a joy to me all my life. It's Bach's Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring.

Presenter10:18

JOHN OGDEN AN ABRENDA LUCAS playing part of Bach's Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring, from Cantata, No. one hundred and forty seven.

Presenter10:26

Presumably, Lady Soames, you you grew up believing that everybody's father made speeches and was written about in newspapers and had opinions on great matters of state, did you?

Presenter10:37

Yes, I suppose I did. I accepted everything that my father did as something completely normal. You know, you take these things in childhood and growing up, I think, perfectly naturally.

Presenter10:51

But of course, as I became older and started to follow

Presenter10:57

public events and sort of was able to understand more of the things that were being talked about at Chartwell.

Presenter11:04

I naturally then became tremendously imbued with

Presenter11:08

the feeling of of, for instance, of of impending doom. I remember very s well I mean, being anguished by Munich and

Presenter11:19

Of course, I was already, I was sixty and a half then, but I remember clearly being able to sort of understand anyhow in a

Presenter11:27

Perhaps rather simplest way

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What my father and his colleagues were on about. So when you went to school, did you come up against this with with other children, other girls, and what their parents were telling them? Yes. I did.

Presenter11:42

Particular

Presenter11:43

As we got on sort of 1936, 37, 38. But I remember distinctly being highly emotional and distraught at the time of our betrayal of Czechoslovakia, and in prayers at school, the head mistress, who was a strong supporter of Mr Chamberlain, said that we would now pray for Mr Chamberlain. And as we were going out of prayers, I burst into tears and said I think it'd be more appropriate to have prayed for the Czechs whom we've betrayed, and got frightfully sat on by the head girl and some of the mistresses who were very munichois of the piece of music.

Presenter12:24

This next song

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Is

Presenter12:27

Very corny old number, but I love it. It reminds me of my romantic 17s and 18s, and when I was particularly when I was in the army and when I was stationed in London, and I used to have, on evenings out, I used to have a lovely time in London with friends who were on leave.

Presenter12:50

This song reminds me so much of London in the war, and you know, I hope to God we'll never have the chance ever to know London in a blackout again. But for those of us who can remember it, on the nights when there wasn't a raid,

Presenter13:06

A moonlight night in blacked out London was one of the most beautiful and

Presenter13:13

Thrilling sights you can imagine the the whole city drenched in moonlight and no light other light at all.

Speaker 413:21

The moon that lingered over London town For puzzled Moon, he wore a frown. How could he know we two were so in love? The whole darned world seemed upside down. The streets of town were paved with stars. It was such a romantic affair.

Speaker 413:45

And as we kissed and said goodnight, The nightingale sang wonderfully.

Presenter13:56

A Nightingale sang in Barclay Square, sung by Anne Lenner with Carol Gibbons and the Savoy Hotel Orpheans.

Presenter14:03

Your seventeenth birthday was a major turning point in your life, I think, Mary Soames. You left school, you left Chartwell, the only home you'd ever known, and it was September 1939 and war was declared. You eventually joined the ATS and, frankly, you must have been mixing with people you hadn't known existed before. Yes, I mean it was an amazing experience which I shall never, never regret. It was extraordinary. It was wonderful. Very interesting, very exciting, quite hard at times. But people, I understand, who used language that you'd never heard before.

Presenter14:36

No, but I cottoned on to it like anything.

Lady Soames14:41

Yes, I'm afraid I ha

Presenter14:43

I'm afraid I have. You've quite enjoyed it.

Presenter14:46

You you ended up, though, um later on in the war, accompanying your father on on some of his journeys abroad, didn't you? Now how how did that come about? Well, after my father had his first

Presenter14:58

illness, which wasn't very much uh talked about. Oh, I it wasn't very serious, but he had a little tiny heart attack when he was in America at one time. And the War Cabinet

Presenter15:10

ordained, virtually ordained, that when he went on these journeys that either my mother or one of us should go with him. So you went uh that was how you came to go in july nineteen forty five to Potsdam, where he was meeting Stalin and Truman.

Lady Soames15:27

Yes.

Presenter15:29

Do you do you have any strong memories of that occasion?

Presenter15:33

Oh yes. I remember two things very particularly. One thing was that it was in that extraordinary gap between Polling Day

Presenter15:43

In the 1945 general election, and if you remember, there was a very long gap. There was a gap of over three weeks while the votes from the units overseas were brought home and counted, and so the result of poll was separated. And in that time, the Potsdam Conference took place. So there was this extraordinary feeling that we were living a little bit in limbo. And it was very odd, very odd, while the ballot boxes held their secret. And I remember going with my father the first time he visited President Truman. And the big three were all in these big villas in the Potsdam garden suburbs, rather grand villas with gardens. And it was so close, it was what, five hundred yards up the road. My father and Anthony Eden and his secretaries and I, we all walked up the President Truman's villa.

Presenter16:36

And I know my father was really sort of anxious. And naturally I didn't go in to I s sat outside in the private office and

Presenter16:46

passed the time of day with with everybody there, and presently my father came out, and I remember it so clearly, walking home, and I could feel the sort of lightness in his step, and he said to me, It's going to be all right. He's splendid. It's going to be all right. We can work I can work with him.

Presenter17:06

Record number four.

Presenter17:09

I've always been very fond of poetry, and I would miss poetry on my desert island if I didn't have some sort of anthology, and there's a very good record which is of best-loved verse, and from this record I would very much now like to hear Marvels to His Coy Mistress.

Lady Soames17:32

An hundred years should go to praise Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze Two hundred to adore each breast, But thirty thousand to the rest An age at least to every part, And the last age should show your heart.

Lady Soames17:50

For lady, you deserve this state, Nor would I love at lower rate.

Lady Soames17:56

But at my back I always hear Time's winged chariot hurrying near, And yonder all before us lie Deserts of vast eternity. Thy beauty shall no more be found, Nor in thy marble vault shall sound My echoing song then worms shall try That long preserv'd virginity, And your quaint honour turn to dust, And into ashes all my lust.

Lady Soames18:24

The grave's a fine and private place, But none, I think, do there embrace.

Presenter18:32

Richard Pascoe reading part of Marvell's To His Coy Mistress.

Presenter18:35

You would have been twenty three then when uh your father suffered that defeat in the general election of forty five.

Presenter18:43

How difficult was it for him to cope with such rejection? You witnessed it, obviously, very closely. After bringing people to victory, to be rejected in that way. Oh, yes, he minded very much.

Presenter18:54

But both he and my mother were far too proud to show how much they minded, and I find that even now people say to me, Did your father really mind being defeated in nineteen forty five?

Presenter19:08

But there are marvellous letters from

Presenter19:12

my mother to m myself, saying because I had to go back obviously to my unit, and um saying, you know, that we keep a smiling face and but it is quite hard, and your father feels it very much. You you say that she wrote about him to you in that way.

Presenter19:29

He was her life's work, wasn't he?

Lady Soames19:31

Oh yeah.

Presenter19:33

She was she dedicated herself to his life and indeed in his life she found the fulfilment of her own and I think they were most perfectly matched. You, however, have have have made a point, as I said in the introduction, throughout your life about being a a good mother and wanting to be a good mother and a good wife. But do you think that it's because of your experience with your own mother and your own parents that you felt that so strongly?

Presenter20:01

Yes, I suppose it is. I mean, I hope I've been a good mother. They're all very sweet to me now. But I think I was more with my children than my mother was with hers. And my mother said something anguishing to me once, which was um it was when we were living at Charter, and I suppose my children were then sort of seven, six, five, four, three, two and one. And um

Presenter20:25

It was in the middle of the holidays, and I don't know what we were doing. We were having picnics or riding or something. And my mother was there. She often used to come down. And she said to me with infinite sadness one day, she said, I see you have a lot of fun with your children. I think I missed out on that. And I felt so sad for her.

Presenter20:49

Next record.

Presenter20:53

The next record

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What I want to hear, please, is the battle hymn of the Republic.

Presenter21:01

This hymn

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Poem has the most moving and deep.

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Um the emotive

Presenter21:12

meaning for me.

Presenter21:13

My father loved it, and knew it from start to finish, word for word.

Presenter21:21

And I think I learnt it from him. He would half chant, half say it.

Presenter21:27

And we'd all join in with the Glory Hallelujahs, of course. But I knew that hymn.

Presenter21:33

Word perfect from when I was a child.

Presenter21:38

And then, of course, later.

Presenter21:40

Much, much later, it was sung at his magnificent state funeral at St Paul's. So I'd like to hear that now, please.

Speaker 422:03

I have seen him in the watch house of a hundred circling glance. They have killed him when open in the evening music dance. I can read his righteous sentence, Why the demon flirting lance is to

Presenter22:50

The Battle Hymn of the Republic, sung by Leontine Price, with the National Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Charles Gerhardt.

Presenter22:57

You were happily married to Christopher Soames for forty years, who was to become Lord Soames, of course. You went to Paris together, didn't you? In 1968, he became British ambassador there. Was it Harold Wilson who chose you? Yes, it was. It was all very surprising, because Christopher had lost his seat in the 1966 election. And, of course, my father died in 1965. And in 1968, to everybody's astonishment, not least Christopher's and mine, Harold Wilson and George Brown asked him to go to Paris because they wanted to try to break the French embargo on Britain joining the common market. They wanted to soften up de Gaulle. Yes, that's right. And so off we went. It was a great adventure. And of course Chris had never been a diplomat or anything, adored I, so.

Lady Soames23:41

And I'm not sure.

Presenter23:44

And did you meet the general? Oh, yes, and of course I'd met him in nineteen forty.

Presenter23:49

I was always rather frightened of him, of course, for he was a very grand and rather forbidding personality.

Presenter23:56

I remember so well sitting next to him at luncheon.

Presenter23:59

one day at the Elysee, and I was

Presenter24:02

terror struck, struck dumb, though I know you will think that strange. But he said to me, Madame, what do you do in Paris? It was a rather strange question. So I said, Oh, Monsieur le President, I walk my dogs more idiotic thing.

Presenter24:18

The great man addressed his mind to this Oh, really? And where do you walk them? Well, you see, I come out of the back gate of the embassy, and I cross the Champs-Élysées you know at the bottom yes, I know at the bottom and I go down on to the towpath of the Seine. On we went like this. Meanwhile, meat course was finished, pudding was come. And then he said, Have you ever walked on the Isle des Seine? and I said, No. Oh, he said, You must take your dogs there.

Presenter24:47

And so whenever afterwards I walked on the Isle des Scine I always thought grateful thoughts to the General.

Presenter24:55

Record number six.

Presenter25:00

This next record.

Presenter25:02

has very special memories for me. It's a very beautiful, I think, impromptu of Schubert's, and the part that I hope you're going to play for me

Presenter25:13

It reminds me of the time when Christopher was sent to be the last British Governor of Southern Rhodesia to preside over the cease fire and to bring about, unhoped, peaceful elections and to bring

Presenter25:32

Rhodesia into independent Zimbabwe.

Presenter25:36

And Christopher was terribly, terribly worried. He had this wonderful team with him.

Presenter25:42

But he was very worried, and he couldn't get to sleep at night. And this particular piece we're going to hear now, it used to have the most wonderfully relaxing and soothing effect on him, and I used to sort of feel him relaxing, and then presently quiet breathing, and I know he was gone to sleep.

Presenter26:02

and it reminds me of those extraordinary days and nights.

Presenter27:04

Alfred Brendel playing part of Schubert's Impromptu number two, opus a hundred and forty two, in A flat major, her memories of Southern Rhodesia in nineteen seventy nine.

Presenter27:14

You sadly were denied a happy retirement together when Lord Soames died in nineteen eighty seven. Has widowhood, after forty years of obviously very happy marriage, may I ask, perhaps been one of the most difficult things you've had to cope with in your life?

Presenter27:30

Yes.

Presenter27:32

But um

Presenter27:34

I feel really how terribly lucky we were.

Presenter27:38

It's not nothing to have had forty years of really great happiness, and we did a lot of things together.

Presenter27:45

And we had five wonderful children.

Presenter27:48

And

Presenter27:49

So I really

Presenter27:51

think that it would be churlish.

Presenter27:53

To complain.

Presenter27:55

But yes, I did. I do find it. I still find it difficult, actually.

Presenter27:59

Five children, as you say, and eight or more, eight and another grandchild on the way. Eight and a half. Life is hardly dull or empty. It certainly isn't.

Lady Soames28:03

Eight and a half.

Presenter28:07

And they throng round and they it's wonderful. I must ask you about uh the book that you wrote in 1979. A tremendous success. You wrote a book, the first book you'd ever written, about your mother, Clementine Churchill, and it won the Wolfson Prize for History and the Yorkshire Post Prize for a First Work. Were you surprised by its success? Were you surprised that you could do it? Oh, yes. I mean staggered, deeply relieved that it was thought acceptable.

Presenter28:31

But it was Christopher who rarely made me do it.

Presenter28:34

He said to me one day, he said, you know, your mother ought to have a book about her, not just as an appendage to your father. And then he said, And you ought to write it. So I said, Oh, don't be ridiculous. I haven't ever written a book and I couldn't write a book and you know he said no, I seriously mean it, because your mother is a the most intensely private person I've ever met and she won't talk, you know, to somebody else, and somebody else also will get her wrong. And so I talked to my mother about the idea, and to my astonishment she said, Oh, what yes, I would rather like it. And she sent me there and then this was right back in 1963 or something um

Presenter29:14

Sent me all her papers. She'd been a great keeper of papers. Both my parents did. They had tin boxes with a lid open. And then, as letters came in, they threw them in to the tins, then closed one up and the other one I wrote. So the letters were all there, including the whole the nugget of her archive, with a wonderful correspondence which she had had throughout her married life on and off with my father. It nevertheless takes great courage to pick up your pen, not just for the first time, but also to write about something so close to you. It takes a lot of courage, I would have thought.

Presenter29:48

Well, perhaps fools rush in where angels fear to tread. I did find it difficult. I found it all very difficult. And I'm glad I finished it in the end.

Presenter29:56

Record number seven.

Presenter29:59

Oh, this is such a splendid piece. I want to hear Dame Kirita Kanawa singing Let the Bright Seraphim

Presenter30:08

By handle. I heard it

Presenter30:11

for the first time at the royal wedding.

Presenter30:16

and which of course was the most lovely occasion. It was thrilling to be there. And also it was a rather thrilling day for Christopher and me because our granddaughter Clementine was the smallest bridesmaid. But I do remember particularly being struck by this really wonderful and thrilling piece of music and this lovely voice sailing out into St Paul's Cathedral.

Speaker 430:52

Populist eating into terra

Speaker 431:08

Yeah.

Presenter31:43

Dame Kierie Takano was singing part of Handel's Let the Bright Seraphim with the English Chamber Orchestra conducted by Barry Rose. There is, I have to say, a a convincing modesty that runs through your life as one reads about you. Uh you've you've said in the past that you were a persevering plodder at school, that you weren't a political animal, you just happened to have met a lot of gifted and talented people, and you've been very lucky and so on. Perhaps your greatest fault may be that you've underestimated your own talents. Do you do you feel you could or should have done more?

Presenter32:13

Well, I hadn't thought of it like that. Of course.

Presenter32:17

I don't know what would have happened if there hadn't been the war. What job would I have done? Perhaps I'd been dreadful flop at it. I've always found I mean, I've been so lucky that my father and my husband both brought so much into my life.

Presenter32:34

Underestimation of one's talents, if that's what it is, is something that perhaps the children of great men will always feel that that because you're the the daughter of a national institution

Presenter32:46

It's very difficult ever to feel that you could compete or or perhaps feel in any way totally adequate. But I think it's very difficult. Certainly I think it was very difficult for my brother. I think it is difficult. I think this is perhaps one of the lacks in my life. I mean, I haven't missed it, but I I've never had really to compete.

Presenter33:06

And so I don't know how I would have fared if I had had to struggle and fend and f find my own way. I suppose I've been very spoilt, and a lot of things have just dropped into my lap. Last record.

Presenter33:24

I've always all my life loved singing hymns. They've always meant a lot to me. I know a lot of them. I mean, you can say that they're very sloppy or bad tunes or bad words. But my goodness, there are a lot of hymns which are both wonderful words and wonderful music. And I think I would like to have on my desert island a a record of collected hymns and it would um

Presenter33:51

comfort me and strengthen me, and I would love to march about my island singing some of my favourites. And this one I've chosen is very special for me. It's'O Worship the King' all Glorious Above and I remember particularly all through my life, but most particularly because we had it at our wedding.

Speaker 434:51

Save of his grace.

Speaker 434:54

Whose true is the light, whose cannon is face.

Speaker 435:02

This is how I got the song for all.

Speaker 435:06

Before

Presenter35:13

O Worship the King, sung by the Huddersfield Choral Society, conducted by Owine Arwell Hughes. So, Lady Soames, which of those records is the most important to you of the eight?

Presenter35:24

I think the Beethoven Symphony. And what about a book as well as the Bible and Shakespeare?

Presenter35:30

I thought a lot about the book.

Presenter35:32

And

Presenter35:34

It's I would like to take Chateaubriand's Memoire du Tre Torbes.

Presenter35:40

Memories from Beyond the Grave. If I'm on the island long enough and finish it, it'll teach me so much French history of a period which was full of everything the Revolution, Napoleon, the Restoration

Presenter35:53

So I'll come out of my island, perhaps speaking rather grand, formal French, and will have mastered the subjunctive, which I rarely tread cautiously round now. That's the book I'd like to take. And your luxury. I would like, please, a supply of fine Havana cigars.

Lady Soames35:59

Try red.

Presenter36:11

In a humidor, so that they will be kept in perfect condition, and, very important, a box of matches to light them with. Because you thoroughly enjoy them, just like your father before you. I love them. To me they they breathe a phil philosophic

Presenter36:28

um atmosphere and um postprandial thought and contentment. I can't be hurried. I can't it has I have to be in a nice relaxed mood.

Presenter36:40

You shall have them. Mary Soames, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs. Thank you so much.

Speaker 236:53

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.